The Vision of the Ram - Daniel 8:1-4

“I Daniel had a vision, after that one that had already
appeared to me” indicates that the previously recorded visions
of the four beasts (chapter 7) were recorded before this
vision (Chapter 8). This was done for prophetic and literary
purposes.

Daniel was not physically in the citadel of Susa, but
transported there in his vision. The prophet Ezekiel had a
similar experience in which he was transported in a vision
to Jerusalem (Ezekiel 8-10). The fortress of Susa was 230
miles east of Babylon and 120 miles north of the Persian
Gulf. It became the royal city of Cyrus and so continued
in the time of Xerxes and Esther. Now the city is famous
for the Hammurabi Code, a sophisticated ethical and moral
law that predated Moses.

The first Babylonian kingdom had seized Susa, the
capital of Elam. Susa was destroyed during the
Neo-Babylonian Empire by Ashurbanipal in 640 B.C., rebuilt
in 521 B.C., and later restored to its greatness by Darius
Hystaspis. Susa’s existence as a city is doubtful in 551
B.C. Therefore, Daniel is transported in the vision to the
future.

The nine hundred foot-wide artificial Ulai Canal passed
near Susa and flowed from the Choaspes (modern Kerkha
River). Standing by the Ulai Canal, Daniel sees the vision
unfold before him.

I looked up, and there before me was a ram with two
horns, standing beside the canal, and the horns were long.
One of the horns was longer than the other but grew up
later. I watched the ram as he charged towards the west
and the north and the south. No animal could stand against
him, and none could rescue from his power. He did as he
pleased and became great.

The ram symbolizes the Medo-Persian alliance. The
smaller horn is Media, the longer and later horn is
Persia. The detail is similar to the beast that looked
like a bear raised up on one side. Persia would become
stronger than Media. Cyrus and his Persians came later
than Cyaxeres and Astyages of Media. Herodotus relates
some blood curdling accounts of Cyrus’ acquirement of the
kingdom of the Medes (Histories, Book I, 113130).

The ram was the guardian spirit of Persia. The ram is
frequently found on Persian seals and when the king of
Persia led his army, he wore the head of a ram instead of
a crown. A zodiacal document from the Persian period shows
each country represented by an animal. Persia appeared
under the ram and Syria under Capricorn, symbolized by a
goat. In addition, Babylonian astrological charts show
Persia represented by the constellation of the ram and
Syria as the goat. In Daniel’s vision, the goat represents
Greece.

The three directions the ram charged were the three
areas of Medo-Persian expansion: West (Lydia, Ionia,
Thrace, and Macedonia); North (Caspians of the Caucasus
Range and the Scythians east of the Caspian Sea and the
Oxus Valley to the Aral Sea); and South (Babylon and
Egypt). Medo-Persian troops were nearly invincible and
Cyrus II became arrogant over his universal success. He
became known as Cyrus the Great.